Cat Videos Will Be Scratching Into Their Own Festival In August

It was only a matter of time, I suppose, before cat videos got so popular and ubiquitous as to command its own festival, where cat aficionados could gather into one place and share their love of kitty mischief and cuteness. Katie Czarniecki Hill is running Cat Video Film Festival on August 30 in Minneapolis at Walker Arts Center’s Open Field. And I imagine this will be successful, considering what we know about the popularity of cat videos. After all, remember, when Google built a neural network for facial recognition, even it recognized what a cat was without being told what a cat was.

Internet Cat Video Festival in Minneapolis, Minnesota

So if you’re living in New York City or Denver or Austin, so sorry, this is in Minneapolis. I wonder if people will come from all over to see this festival? Hill claims that these cat videos will be “carefully curated,” so expect to see the best of the best of the best.

Hill says:

It’s no secret that internet cat videos have been all the rage for some time now. Traditionally, we send these viral gems to one another via email or share them through various social media outlets. Some viewers (yours truly included) spend precious free time obsessively occasionally trolling the interwebs for hilarious 30-second clips of feline tomfoolery. Either way, while enjoyed by a broad online audience of millions, cat videos are normally viewed alone.

I think this is a pretty good idea. It’s a popular “medium” or “genre” and it gets people out of the house and congregating with other cat and cat video lovers. But Hill even invites the “dog lovers” and “cool chicks” and “dudes” and whoever else might not be associated with a love of felines.

There’s a reason why “cat videos” is such a cliche on YouTube, and it’s because cats are freaking hilarious and provide crazy moments every day, and shooting video for posterity along with the ease of use of YouTube made a natural marriage there. Here’s one of the early hits, not surprisingly called “Funny Cats:”

Hill links to some classics in the blog post. Here are a few of them, including “Catvertising:”

That’s a video which alludes to the awesome “Stalking Cat:”

Surprised Kitty:

Who could forget one of the early YouTube classic cat videos, Keyboard Cat:

Or “The two talking cats:”

I wonder if they’ll play some version of Nyan Cat at the festival? Oooo…maybe the 100 hour version? They might get kicked off the lawn before that ends, but looks like cat lovers will have plenty of prime footage to watch come August.

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